Scottish girl and her kooky family move to the States in 1981. Hilarity ensues. She grows up and marries a nice Jewish boy. Hilarity ensues. They adopt two awesome girls from China. Hilarity ensues. She writes a blog. Hilarity ensues?

Tuesday, February 05, 2008

Thoughts from Super DorksDay!

My girl JulieG and I were just IM'ing while watching the election returns. I asked, "are we total dorks for being so excited?" She sagely said that she fully embraces that kind of dorkhood. And so do I.

In watching the returns, a few items jumped out at me:

1. I think CNN overstates Obama's loss in Massachusetts. They keep talking about HRC's victory in the face of the endorsements by Ted and Caroline Kennedy and John Kerry. I don't want to burst anyone's bubble, but I think most people in Massachusetts will tell you that they have no particular regard one way or the other for the Kennedys. Yeah, there are always haters and lovers. But the vast majority of Massholes, I am certain, are positively ambivalent about "The Kennedys" as a collective proper noun. I think their endorsement was symbolic and certainly welcome, as most endorsements are. But to characterize Senator Clinton's win in Massachusetts as some kind of repudiation of the Kennedys is a bit of a stretch. Yes, it gives Wolf B something to yammer about on the telly, but it's not--from the perspective of your average Masshole--something on which to hang an entire theory of victory.

2. Yes, Romney did win Massachusetts. But no one is mentioning that 44% of MA Republicans voted for McCain. That's hardly a rousing show of support for our fearless former governor.

3. Why is no one asking Mike Huckabee, who just espoused his view of the Sanctity of Life and how all Americans are entitled to equal protection under the law, why his regard for a fetus' rights to equal protection doesn't extend to gay Americans and others who don't meet his Bible-based view of the world.

4. Everyone is waiting to see how California shakes out in the wee hours of the Eastern-time morning, but what of the millions of California residents who voted via absentee ballot? Will those votes swing the race one way or another? Will there really be reliable results at midnight?

5. Also in California, as CNN reports the "winner," will they make viewers aware that the Democratic Party's rules regarding the splitting of delegates by percentage means that a candidate could lose in California by 6 points and still be neck-and-neck in the delegate count? On the other side of the coin, in the GOP's winner-take-all process, McCain with 38% of the vote, Huckabee with 33% and Romney with 29%, McCain would "win" every single delegate even though more people voted for other candidates than for him.

on Mass, the reality is that Kennedy,Kerry and Patrick were pretty much the only ones in Obama's camp. The rest of the establishment was for Clinton and they control the ground game. Gov. Patrick had to go around the pols to win and that was first in a 3-way race then against a pretty awful GOP opponent so there was strong independent support (Thank you Mitt). Kennedy etal. aren't the be all and end all of mass politics but they they were pushing against the rest of the party on this one.